Author Marketing Impacts Search Engine Optimization

I don’t mean the spelling of the name. I mean the uniqueness of the name.

I am Scott Bateman. An exact match search of “scott bateman” on Bing produces 119,000 entries in the index. A similar search on Google displays 57,000 listings. Why Bing has double the entries of Google is interesting by itself, but it’s a subject for another time.

The 119,000 entries on Bing is well beyond the number of articles and other activities by me over a long career. So it’s obvious there are other Scott Batemans. Actually, there are quite a few.

If someone read or heard about me and did a search on my name, they would get quite a few Scott Batemans in a highly inefficient search. The results would include multiple references to a variety of people with my name ranging from vanity websites to social media accounts and much more.

So the common first and last name isn’t good enough when an author wants effective marketing.

The Simple Answer

Fixing the problem and improving search results is as simple as adding a middle initial or — in the case of the most common names — adding the entire middle name. Some situations call for both answers.

My middle name is Sterling. By adding an “S.” to every profile and byline I can find, I have been able to get much better search results. The improvement shows up both in broad match (without quotes around the name) and exact match searches.

Searchers may not use the middle initial in the first attempt. Seeing it show up on documents by me increases the odds that they will use it in later searches.

But search efficiency may not be the most important reason to use a middle initial or full middle name. It may also increase author trust and authority with search engines.

SEO Trust and Authority

The following idea is theory because few outsiders know the details of search algorithms. But the idea has sound logic.

Search engines can’t always know if an article by “Scott Bateman” and another article by “Scott Bateman” are written by the same person because more than one of them exists.

Assume I write a high quality 2,000-word article on a subject. Another Scott Bateman writes a low quality 200-word article on a similar subject. I certainly don’t want the other author to get the credit by search engines.

By consistently using “Scott S. Bateman”, the search engines will know which articles I wrote. Just as importantly, the entire collection of articles potentially increase my SEO authority based on their quantity and quality.

Weeding out the low quality articles by other articles will prevent damage to that trust and authority.

Credibility and Reputation

I don’t want search engines to think that someone else wrote that 2,000 word article. But in the same way, I don’t want searchers to think I wrote the low quality 200-word article either.

Someone who does a search on “Scott Bateman” will literally find an article by “him” with the title of “F— Yeah White Privilege”. I didn’t write it, and I sure don’t want anyone else to think I wrote it.

So getting the author’s name as unique and specific as possible will improve search engine optimization, certainly protect reputation and credibility, and potentially improves SEO trust and authority.